There is a big difference betweeen probability of getting one concrete protein sequence (which is quite small), and probability of getting any protein
from the group of many functional proteins (which approaches one, due to natural selection immidiatelly discarding all proteins that do not belong to
this group) using evolution process.

The number of functional proteins (if we take into account myriads of possible paths life could evolve) could be quite large.

Thats exactly it in a nutshell ... mathematical odds ... and there's no escaping them or bypassing them.

Now that's just funny.

The very thing about odds is that they ARE beatable. That's why people win lotteries, or make fortunes on horse-races, or win at poker. Casinos make
more money than the gamblers, but gamblers keep gambling because some of them do get lucky.

Probabilities are by definition escapable, because they are NOT certainties.

Originally posted by drakus
Another thing that I think we must never forget is that the Universe seems to be biased toward life.

This is not true. Just yesterday I read that eg. cosmological constant is certainly not biased
toward life. Also did you ever think that maybe the whole thing is the other way around. We evolved in this Universe and thus we are fine tuned
for it.

Also why hasn't OP replied to me? What's the point of all this if you don't reply to the criticism?

Your fallacy is assuming that nature must select ONLY the insulin, and no other protein (or entirely different evolutionary path) would suffice.

You're missing the point entirely.

I used the insulin protein as an example and because it's a relatively short one composed of only 153 nucleotide sequences.
But doing the maths shows that the odds of nature randomly assembling this short sequence is approximately 8 x 10^90 against. Do you
have any idea how huge those odds are ... they're astronomical and more !
And insulin is just one amongst the approximately 25,000 other human proteins that nature has "evolved" through random trial and error.

Ok, I can just barely, barely, barely accept that nature may just have some how fluked it with insulin ... but how do you explain nature doing it
another 25,000 times ... and some of those proteins are longer than insulin which means the odds against the longer ones is beyond imagination.

Honestly, can you explain how nature pulled off such an incredible feat ? Simply saying "but nature obviously did do it so thats good enough
for me" won't cut the mustard.

Originally posted by tauristercus
Ok, I can just barely, barely, barely accept that nature may just have some how fluked it with insulin ... but how do you explain nature doing it
another 25,000 times ... and some of those proteins are longer than insulin which means the odds against the longer ones is beyond imagination.

You are missing my point. I know probability of nature arriving at one concrete protein sequence is very small. But probability of nature arriving at
at least one sequence from the sum of many functional sequences is still 1, if you include natural selection.

Lets say you throw a dice 153 times, and come up with one concrete sequence of numbers. What was the probability you come up with this exact sequence
before rolling the dice? It was 8,77 x 10^-120, even smaller than your insuline example . And yet it happened. And because the probability of other
myriads sequences appearing is exactly the same, there is nothing supernatural about that - one of them is bound to appear, you just cannot know in
advance which one. And even if different one appeared, it wont change your question. Therefore the question is meaningless.

What would happen if the insuline evolved differently? Nothing. You would be here asking us why the alternative insuline with for example 66
aminoacids could be arranged by nature in a correct sequence randomly, ignoring that the number of possible functional proteins suitable for the task
could be as astronomical as the probabilities involved, and ignoring natural selection, ignoring that protein functionality is very often a continuous
function of the sequence with many local minima and maxima, derivation from other already evolved stable functional proteins, whole gene groups
duplications, majority of junk DNA in the genome and many more variables integral to evolution.

Looking at nothing but the mathematical odds logically defeats Darwinism quite handily as you continue to explain in this thread, that is if you are
willing to explore, examine and inform yourself of them.
Denial is a fundamental trait that all humans display in all area's of life for various reasons.
The denial of factual math is quite sad to observe however. It's like saying 1+1 doesn't equal 2 because we don't want it to. It's an emotionally
based perspective.

No it doesn't.

Look, I had game theory at uni as part of my MSc in Real Estate. If there's one thing I learned, it's that if something can happen, it eventually
will happen. To give you an example, winning the lottery is highly unlikely. In fact, depending on the type of lottery, you might only be likely to
win once in 256 MILLION years if you play once a week. Other lotteries are "easier" and you're likely to win once out of 120 million tries.

However, now look at how many people win the lottery every single week. It should be an incredibly rare event, yet it still happens.

Your chances of getting hit by lightning are approximately 2.5mil to 1, which is still a lot higher than you winning the lottery...yet people say
getting hit by lightning is super rare.

Now consider the timeframe of evolution, and you will realize that when it comes to probabilities, the whole thing is most definitely NOT impossible.

The hilarious thing is, what are those "scientists" basing their probability figures on when it comes to evolution? Rate of mutation? Mutations
happening at all (that probability would be 100%)? And how do they come up with probability figures for something that has so many "moving parts".
They would have take everything into consideration. Environmental effects, time scale, starting lifeforms, and so on...quite a complicated calculation
that even if you manage to set it up, would still only be an indication. Plus, we've witnessed speciation in the lab and nature, so it's not as if
this calculation would prove/disprove anything

But doing the maths shows that the odds of nature randomly assembling this short sequence is approximately 8 x 10^90 against. Do you have any idea how
huge those odds are ... they're astronomical and more !

Please enlighten us how you came up with that figure. Why at the power of 90? Why 8x10?

I hope you have a credible source and not the Creationism Research Institute as they just pull figures out of their ass.

One is assuming a particular sequence is the only one which works. The one thing can be done in different ways. The
Neanderthals had a gene sequence which caused red hair. We have a different, unrelated sequence that causes red hair. Cats and foxes have still
different sequences. There is not necessarily ony one way to do anything biologically.

The second is assuming high odds against prove a thing cannot happen. If the odds of winning are 9 to 1 against, and I play
a thousand times, it's likely I'll win ten times. Creationists like to believe that pulling some monsterously huge number out of their collective
arsehole means that something with those odds against cannot happen. But if there's a trillion trillion odds against and I play a trillion trillion
trillion times, the chances are I'll get a trillion wins.

Many of the gene sequences we use have not involved in humans, and not even evolved in animals. They have evolved in the uncountable numbers of virii
and bacteria we have been in contact with while evolving to our present form, and which have exchanged or donated DNA or RNA with us.

There is also the fact which creationists can't seem to comprehend, which is that however high the odds, given one roll of the dice, one still might
win.

The third is assuming our genetic sequences were the result of random chance and had to instantly come into existance in
their present form. However many sequences are built up of parts of other sequences which may have had a lesser function, a different function or no
useful function at all. Any slight usefulness is selected for and then improved on naturally. The fact that mutations are random does not mean the
final results are random.

The fourth is assuming there is something special and preordained about the human form, leading creationists to the
egotistic fallacy that this universe was created for us. However, with billions of planets circling their stars, some kind of life was bound to evolve
on some. The fact that one of these (at least) lifeforms learnt to ask questions and invent religion does not prove that lifeform was the result of
any grand plan. Naturally, if that lifeform is egotistic, then from the point of view of that lifeform the environment will seem to be tailor-made for
them, because they evolved in that environment and natural selection is the process of tailor-making a lifeform to suit its environment.

Is it so hard to understand that, given a different environment, we would simply be different or not exist, and there might be nothing in this
universe which would give a damn?

People are afraid of this idea because they fear having no rules or meaning imposed from outside. But I say, whether or not there is a super-creative
intelligence behind things, it is up to ourselves to choose our own rules and give our own lives meaning.

Another thing that I think we must never forget is that the Universe seems to be biased toward life.

Actually as another poster already said that seems to be wrong, some scientists have even discredited this notion BECAUSE they believe in evolution,
the point is because evolution takes so long by the time intelligent life evolves, the Star in their system makes life uninhabitable, and they would
be killed off.

Another thing that I think we must never forget is that the Universe seems to be biased toward life.

Actually as another poster already said that seems to be wrong, some scientists have even discredited this notion BECAUSE they believe in evolution,
the point is because evolution takes so long by the time intelligent life evolves, the Star in their system makes life uninhabitable, and they would
be killed off.
Fascinating article that fully supports evolution. www.science20.com...

Professor Watson's theory is still a bit speculative.
Notice the use of the word "might"?

this process might be governed by a small number of very difficult evolutionary steps.

Professor Watson is suggesting in your article there may be only a 1 in 10,000 chance of intelligent life evolving on any one Earth-like over a period
of 4 billion years of habitable sunlight.

His model, published in the journal Astrobiology, suggests an upper limit for the probability of each step occurring is 10 per cent or less, so
the chances of intelligent life emerging is low – less than 0.01 per cent over four billion years.

Dimitar Sasselov, a Bulgarian-born scientist
working at Harvard Origins of Life Initiative made the amazing statement according to which the Milky Way has at least 150 Earth-like planets
discovered so far by the NASA telescope. Sasselov goes on to assert that in fact the galaxy has about 100 million planets with
conditions similar to those on Earth . During the last 15 years the astronomers have discovered at least 500 planets that look like our Earth.

100,000,000 / 10,000 = 10,000

Enjoy your mathematical proof, Blue Jay, that even if Prof Watson is correct about the low probability of life evolving on any one planet, it's still
probable that intelligent life has evolved on ~10,000 planets in our galaxy.

Before we speculate how likely it's that evolution leads to intelligent life, we should define intelligent life. Do fish represent intelligent life?
How about molluscs or worms? How about single celled protists? Where do we draw the line?

Originally posted by rhinoceros
Before we speculate how likely it's that evolution leads to intelligent life, we should define intelligent life. Do fish represent intelligent life?
How about molluscs or worms? How about single celled protists? Where do we draw the line?

Professor watson specifies the 4th stage in evolution as being: intelligent life with an established
language
I'd suggest intelligence involves not only the acquisition of language, but also the ability to use it in a logical debate.

Nah, we need to define intelligence as possessing foresight, which is ignored to make life easier in the short-term and survival impossible in the
long-term.

Oxford English Dictionary defines intelligence as the faculty of understanding (first meaning). I'd say anything that shows observational learning,
at the very least, counts as having the faculty of understanding, and therefore being intelligent.

So now we just have to know what shows observational learning (or more sophisticated). Primates, parrots, corvids, cetaceans, pigs and octopuses all
show problem-solving intelligence, which puts them comfortably in there... but only one of those is known to use radio signalling. Observational
learning, less sophisticated, is shown in most if not all of the songbirds, probably in anything with prolonged parental care... I know that I had
cardinal fish that showed observational learning - I had two that never touched flake-food, added some younger ones that did, and shortly after the
young ones willingly took the flake food, the older ones did, too...

That is indeed a blurry line, when we speak about things like intelligence and consciousness, even when comparing species which evolved on the same
planet Earth from a common ancestor. It would probably get far more complex if comparing with intelligent life from other planets, which could evolve
in very different ways, even being hyper intelligent and yet not being conscious in human sense or aware of itself. And this gets further complicated
because there are different kinds of intelligence.
Peter Watts IMHO greatly explores this idea in his hard-sf novel Blindsight

Your comments are very debatable within the scientific community itself.
Because it comes down to the "Drake Equation" verses the "Fermi Paradox", and the perspective that comes out of that debate is pure opinion and can in
no way be factual, we just don't have enough information yet.

This is said about the "Drake Equation"

Another objection is that the very form of the Drake equation assumes that civilizations arise and then die out within their original solar
systems. If interstellar colonization is possible, then this assumption is invalid, and the equations of population dynamics would apply instead. One
reply to such criticisms is that even though the Drake equation currently involves speculation about unmeasured parameters, it
was not meant to be science, but intended as a way to stimulate dialog on these topics.

So yes lets have the dialog, but don't try and prove it, with statistical variables plugged into a math formula's that are suspect to begin with.

Obviously the "phrase" is not a scientific fact, but a philos. one, that's why i said "seems"
I say that the Universe seems to be biased towards life, precisely because i'm here. And I have NEVER seen something in nature that has ONLY ONE
example. (there is not THE FRUIT, there are FRUITS, there is no THE PLANET, there are PLANETS, etc, etc...)
If it happend HERE then it will happen again, and again, and again...

So, there are Billions of stars in a galaxy, and we know of a few million (at least) galaxies......
Then we have the MASSIVE amount of organic material in the dust clouds that give birth to stars...
Mmmmm.....

And about the Fermi paradox, it seems quite irrelevant. The (known) universe is big big big big big big big, so to pretend that it's improbable for
someone to be "out there" just because we haven't found him (in our oh so long few thousand years...) is evidence of having some serious
antropo-ego-trip.
NOTE: This applies only to the EXISTENCE of other civilizations, I agree that we may never encounter one of them in all of our history, but that
proves nothing, because there's no difference between human civilization and any other... So, if there's ONE civilization, there are bound to be
more)

I think an important thing to do would be to stop seeing "life" as a thing, and understanding that it is a process, like fire, that represents
one of the stages in the evolving/moving nature of energy/matter, we may just call "evolution" to the organic evolution, but thing is evolution
started at least at the Big Bang... There's a history of dinamic evolution in this reality, from the most basics form of subatomic interactions to
the (relative) complexity of a living being. I see it as a part of the same movement...
Off course that's MY cosmovision, sprung from studying both the scientific and spiritual ways of aproaching reality...
There's a VERY interesting paper called CosmoBiology (or something similar) that i'll try to find because it develops in a scientific way, this
hipotesis.

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